


So Much Remains to Accomplish

by sanctum_c



Category: Final Fantasy VII (Video Game 1997)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Bleak, Blood and Injury, Evil Aeris, F/M, Sad Ending, The Ends Justify The Means, and hey - it'll all be alright. eventually
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-14
Updated: 2019-07-06
Packaged: 2021-03-09 04:15:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,909
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27088456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanctum_c/pseuds/sanctum_c
Summary: Aeris Gainsborough went to the Forgotten City to pray for Holy. Sephiroth strikes her down. He injures her, but far from enough to stop her fighting back.
Relationships: Aerith Gainsborough/Cloud Strife
Comments: 10
Kudos: 13





	1. Turning the Tables

**Author's Note:**

> Repost of a fic split across Aerith Month 2018 and Renegade Endless Summer - Clerith Flavor for ease of reading.

The blade shot through Aeris and erupted out of her chest. The muscles in her legs gave out, the blazing pain in her chest intensifying, every other part of her now numb. What happened? Not a result of Cloud's actions; the gigantic blade of the Buster Sword still lay nearby after tumbling from his grip. How long did she still have? She could still think - if not move - caught between life and death.

A wrench and time moved on. The blade retracted and the fabric of her dress whispered with the movement. A tremor deep inside; a sharpened edge scraped across bone. So abrupt and effortless going in; so awkward when pulled back. An increase in the pain, near indiscernible on top of her existing agony.

Her hair fell about her shoulders, ribbon fluttered to the ground. A chime nearby; something hard striking the crystalline floor and with it other sounds came flooding back. She fell forwards; the floor rushed up to meet her and the air filled with shouts and screams.

It could not end like this. Not so close to success. Not when so much remained to accomplish.

With a strangled gasp she forced her arms out in front of her, bracing for the impact. Her knuckles smashed against the stone, her wrists wrenched in awkward directions, the strain almost collapsing her to the floor. Lucky if she had not broken her hands - or bruised her knuckles. An almost comical notion; both possibilities the least of her worries now.

She clenched her fingers tighter and braced her wrists. A familiar voice whispered her name somewhere close by. Who? Hard to focus and the pain threatened to overwhelm again. She grit her teeth. Needed to get back on her feet. Her back tensed, the shift in posture sparking a new torrent of pain. Had she torn her wound still further? Or by stopping the fall? No matter. Something to deal with later. With a grunt of effort, Aeris pushed her body upright and back onto her haunches, braced for a new agony. It failed to arrive.

Sephiroth stared down at her, his lips twisted into a sneer. “The Cetra are hardier than I expected.” The Masamune swept up, ready to strike again. Cloud shouted something, his desperate plea echoed by her friends. Aeris could not move or respond; no breath left in her lungs. Every fibre focused on staying upright. So much for her supposed resistance. Sephiroth’s sword arced through the air. Aeris raised her hand. To what end? To ward off the blow? To cast a spell? No chance; a dry mouth and thick tongue rendered her useless.

The sword hit her hand and sliced into her skin. She clutched at it, pain blossoming from her palm, but somehow distant, manageable. Blood trickled down her arm. Sephiroth’s former amusement vanished and his face twisted into fury. He pulled at his sword but Aeris clung tight to it. Sephiroth had roamed free and evaded the repercussions of his perversions for too long. She could hang on, keep on going until the settlement of his debt if nothing else. Aeris found a new strength. Her legs recovered first and an odd sense of refreshment flooded through her up to her hand. Her fingers gripped the blade tighter and Aeris pushed the Masamune back, rising to her feet. She refused to let go and Sephiroth stumbled.

The pain dwindled and the flow of blood from her hand slowed to nothing. “You are an enemy of the Planet.” Not a new revelation; the man's words clear back in the Temple. But now she understood the intricacies of his plans, the true nature of the form before her. Aeris pushed a now wild-eyed Sephiroth backwards. No. Not Sephiroth; something else. She laughed. “You are nothing more than a puppet.” Something perhaps once human but no longer. Whatever the truth, she needed to end the illusion.

Aeris pulled on the Masamune and dragged the puppet closer, her other hand closing around its throat. No pulse there and the thing did not splutter for breath. It squirmed against her grip but she held firm. “I cannot be stopped." One of its hand clawed at her fingers. "You cannot stop me.”

“Perhaps.” Her cold tone sparked a new fear in the puppet. “But I can deny you this vessel.” She tore the Masamune from its hands and sent it sailing somewhere behind her. The fire spell triggered without invocation, a wreath of flame enveloping the thing leaving it shrieking in agony. She held on after it went limp, plumes of black smoke rising into the air. The puppet continued to burn, the blackened remains crumbling into ash.

The soot fell from Aeris's hand; still bloody palm beneath. A wound marred her skin but it no longer hurt, nor did the weakness of before return. She still lived. The assembled members of Avalanche stared at her in shock. Tifa and Yuffie took nervous steps forward, unsure. Aeris smiled. They needed reassurance. They needed a new objective. “We need to head North.”


	2. Completing Her Work

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Written for the prompt '“You did this for me?”'

The Planet was in chaos. A destructive wave began in a lost city, hidden within the Sleeping Forest. The force moved North first, the near isolated resort town around Icicle Inn rendered silent, the Mako reactor ground into so much dust. Stories of terrified inhabitants fleeing South, trying to find warmth; others holed up in their houses and prayed for a miracle. None arrived; the town was now silent and near lost beneath the snow drifts.

The once unscalable Gaea Cliffs scaled without problem; beyond the walls at the stop of the world was a vast shallow depression; what might have been the footprint of a vast impact thousands of years prior. Here Mako bubbled up to the surface in vast streams, the wound slowly healing. A shame, but there was work to do. The force reached down into the crater’s centre. Other agents here, other constructs capable of doing whatever necessary. They slumbered for now, content to leave the work to that which preceded them.

A chunk of crystallised Lifestream was the goal; the current populace called it Materia. Translucent and tough, suspended on a lattice work of crystal. Inside lay the remains of a man long thought dead; a man who glimpsed many times of late all across the world. The force took the Materia; an egg, a cage, what did it matter? Materia was tough, but the will of the Planet worked through the force’s actions. The Materia cracked and splintered, the protective shell broken and the vulnerable cargo within destroyed.

Fire took care of the remains. The bulk of it was gone, but traces remained elsewhere. The enemy defeated but so much remained.

The force returned South. Bone Village’s power knocked offline and all communication with the camp lost. The undersea reactor at Junon torn from the seabed and hurled into the Upper City, the impact rendering the vast Sister Ray inoperative. No one froze when Junon lost power, but those in the city’s hospitals did not last long. Fort Condor decimated; the single Phoenix egg perched high atop destroyed as the force moved. Kalm lost power.

Midgar was not as swift in its destruction. A warning called to the city, an urge to leave before anything more. Some heeded this. Others did not. The force circled the city, one reactor after another destroyed, the Mako vents clogged with rubble. Sector by Sector, Midgar darkened. Shinra tried to flee; the new President and Hojo amongst those who successfully escaped before this symbol of the electric company fell.

The force pursued. Anywhere there was Mako, the force would visit, the force would destroy, the force would move on. Costa del Sol, the decimated North Corel. Gongaga and Cosmo Canyon escaped retribution, but fire razed Nibelheim once more, the Shinra mansion and its subterranean secrets reduced to ash. The town’s Mako reactor wrenched from the mountain-side and cast down into a crevasse. Rocket Town’s aspirations to recapture spaceflight came to naught with their loss of power.

Even Mideel was not spared. Mako power removed piece by piece from the Planet. And each time the force found them, those with Her taint, those who had heard Her song; all returned to the Lifestream. Rufus Shinra found. Hojo found. Neither suffered to live.

And perhaps it might now be over, the Planet calmer, the world saved. There were costs – the costs would be greater without the force’s intervention – but the world would now be safe. She retreated to a familiar locale; to Cosmo Canyon.

That was when Cloud found her.

Aeris had seen little of him after the North Crater. After she crushed Sephiroth with every ounce of fury the Planet had. Avalanche too slow and she so much swifter, so much deadlier. So much more efficient. Fulfilling what they wanted, only faster. The Planet needed saving; why delay? He should be happy. As much as Avalanche’s goal had become his own, he should be happier than this. A pained expression from him as he reached her perch at the top of the canyon.

“Aeris.” A flat tone. Curious.

“Cloud.” She could not help the smile, the pride. “I’ve done it all. I’ve made the world better for you.”

He blinked furiously. “You did this for me?”

She clambered to her feet and moved toward him, a nagging sense of something still not done at the back of her head. “Not just for you. For the Planet.” Not entirely true. If she had not met him, if she had not insisted on going to Sector Seven with him, how much of this could have happened? Cloud did not smile back. Odd. She was forgetting something. Something important.

“It’s-“ He stared at the ground. “A lot of people died without power.”

“I know. I didn’t want to-“ She shrugged. “But I had to do something. Had to stop the reactors.”

“But…” He trailed off, frowning. “Was there no other way?”

Every other way she could conceive of, every other plan Tifa and Barret debated, every other notion would take years at best and with each passing moment, the risk to the future of the Planet only increased. No. No other way. “No.”

He said nothing, mouth opening and closing on the verge of saying something, but not able to articulate anything. His upset would pass in time. She had accomplished everything Avalanche wanted. She had killed his nemesis. The scourge of Jenova destroyed; right down to the last cell. Wait. Not the last cell. “Aeris, I-“

His next word choked off as she gripped his throat. Her vision blurred and tears spilled from her cheeks. Somehow overlooked, this last task always shuffled to the back of her mind. And now there was no ignoring it. “I don’t want to Cloud, but I can’t not.” Her hands tightened, his eyes wide, fingers clawing at her arms. “Jenova still exists inside of you.” He tried to speak, her hands too tight. “I can free you from her. And you’ll come back. You’ll return free from her eventually. Then we can be together.” She smiled, tears still streaming.

“This is goodbye for now.” Aeris Gainsborough, living force of the Planet, channelled a fire spell through her hand. The resulting flame charred the last Jenova cells to ash, vaporising the host body, a would be SOLDIER of the name Cloud Strife, in the process. And at last, her work complete.


End file.
